Guns Must Be Silent Naked Protest Poem by Sarah Mkhonza

When the ground is powdered with bodies
from the salt and pepper shaker of death,
and all around us the smell of blood
mixed with the tears of ants that walk
with hands on the head like me and you
I take of my clothes off in protest.
The strongest truth that speaks
enough is enough with my navel linked to
the next victim's navel in birth
I cry enough is enough!
Guns must be silent.

Why should my shriveled breasts
be babbling biblical truths out here,
telling with the nakedness of an African woman,
angered by a society that kills
itself and walks about clothed,
when bodies lie scattered
on the conscience of the earth
scribbling a tale with no end.

I say guns must be silent now as my hand goes up
to conduct the last salute to tell the world
this is not to be repeated to a people
who cry after each incident when my children have paved
the walkways in death in a silence I could not awaken
to give me back their dream,
which was also an American dream
that folded up when they fell
Like jewel thrown into the deep
Of the forest of time.

The arguments say let us spit death into
each other's faces and hold out guns to
greet each other as if we are furious
at each other always when we live and wake
a nation of endless bickering that will
lead to another blast that drown the ears.

Guns must be silent when you look at these
my sunken eyes which once shone with love
when I heard the first cry
that landed in my ears piercing them forcefully
and grabbing my shriveled C 44 breasts
to suckle there making them so flat
I could lay them on the pavement
a mat for the dead child from Ferguson
because if society says I am mad,
society is also mad and walking about naked and blinded
at gunpoint pulling hair in a madness in the dark
that does not say guns must be silent.

I do not look at history with teary eyes when
the baby pops out from in between these thighs.
I do not go to rallies when I wrap my arms in love
To talk about weapons of hate and stories of death
And argue guns will help us even when pointed at a newborn.
Giving birth in one push is not like taking away life in one shot.
These actions have become cousins at two ends of the rope,
that we have linked together to sit in a raping with wrappings
and sing a chorus of ants that go deep into the earth
to taste the supper we left when the bullet hit.

Guns must be silent for the naked woman has spoken
for working in silence will not drown
another blast that drowns the ears
for the birth of all of you
is a form of naked protest
that is done by two bodies
that stops every action
even that of the shooter looking him in the eye,
saying guns must be silent.

Remember shooter how you gasped for air
How your small head popped out
Held by all of you
Who now stand and suffocate
your own first wail by not voting
that guns must be silent
as on the day you were dropped into my hand
when I first saw your little face,
and you first saw my touch in the love of my eyes.


I stand inside my naked torso
My head not there for in madness
I have thrown it to the scuttling ants
That say to protect ourselves
Guns need to be here.
All my work was nothing
My stomach a dreamless roundness,
To be deflated by one gunshot
that landed its contents on the walkways
Like the spit of a beggar
after eating a spoonful and sensing a fly
that went down the throat by mistake
leaving a taste lingering all over,
the humming of an endless
aria of a society that would do nothing
to protect itself while claiming death can
protect it when it swallows it daily.


This is not the bark of a strange dog
Fighting for space in your ear
but the anger of my mammary glands
That murmur to themselves missing a baby
whose foot danced when feeding from them,
in years past. Yes guns must be silent!